Written by Ben Schoenfield

The No. 24 Oregon Ducks Softball (26-16, 12-8 Pac-12) has a one-off non-conference game versus the University of Northern Colorado Bears (24-22, 9-5 Big Sky) at Jane Sanders Stadium in Eugene, Ore. at 11:00 a.m. on April 28. Both teams are coming off of a 2-1 series win; the Ducks against Oregon St. and the Bears against Portland St.

Oregon:

The Ducks have one regular season series left after this game, and it is against arguably the best team in the Pac-12, the Stanford Cardinal. Oregon is coming off of a slightly disappointing series against the second-worst team in the Pac-12, Oregon St., being shut out in one game. The Ducks still need to use the motivation and camaraderie of playing for Hanna Delgado to not lose sight of the goal. This game against Northern Colorado could be a trap game if they are only looking ahead.

Oregon's defense has found a little bit of consistency only having one game where it allowed more than five runs in in the past three weeks, including last week where it allowed exactly three runs in each of the three games. But at the same time, its offense has been streaky, in the series against Oregon St. it scored 11 runs followed by zero and finally eight.

Ariel Carlson leads the Pac-12 in home runs with 14 and is second in RBIs with 50 behind Scupin of Arizona. Kai Luschar is third in batting average behind Dayton and Denning of Utah. Oregon as a team is third in the Pac-12 with a .974 fielding percentage behind only Washington and Arizona.

Northern Colorado:

The Bears are coming down from Portland after playing the Portland St. Vikings three times in two days. They won that series 2-1 with the scores being 9-5, 0-1, and 4-0. This game in Eugene is the last game of Northern Colorado's regular season. Northern Colorado is coming into this game as the best team in the Big Sky according to conference record, but Sacramento St. has the best overall record. The conference tournament takes place May 8-11.

The Bears have five batters with at least 23 RBIs, including Amailee Morales who is tied with Ariel Carlson with 50 RBIs. Morales also leads the team in home runs with 10 on the season. Northern Colorado's Erin Caviness has a 15-7 record with 17 complete games with a 2.26 ERA and a 1.01 WHIP. The team as a whole has a .956 fielding percentage led by catcher Sabrina Javorsky and Amailee Morales.

Predictions:

Oregon will take this game handily if it focuses on this game. If it doesn't it will be a lot closer than expected. My prediction is that Oregon wins this 14-4 in a run-rule game in the sixth inning. It will take the momentum into their last weekend of the Pac-12 regular season.